An unclassified document that outlines a US Army training exercise scheduled for this summer includes a color-coded map that refers to Texas as “hostile territory” and calls a portion of California an “insurgent pocket,” leading a certain fringe on the internet to claim the exercise is really a dress rehearsal for a government plot to declare martial law.

The training exercise, known as Jade Helm 15, is scheduled to take place between July 15 and September 15 across parts of Texas, California, Arizona, and New Mexico, and will involve Green Berets, Navy SEALs, and other Special Ops forces. The uproar is over a slideshow presentation that outlines the effects the exercises might have on local populations. The US Army would not confirm the legitimacy of the document.

Conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones have been screeching about imminent martial law for years.

The above banner is taken from his InfoWars website in the year 2000. (Read More)

On the Sleuth Journal, a website that describes itself as an independent alternative media organization and also sells “preparedness and survival items,” author Dave Hodges said the drill was actually about “the brutal martial subjugation of the people of Texas, Utah and Southern California who have risen up against some unspecified tyranny.”

“A careful analysis reveals how this drill is connected to Army policies associated with the confinement of detainees in what is commonly called FEMA camps!” Hodge wrote, describing a conspiracy theory in which the government imprisons citizens in FEMA disaster camps. “This drill is undoubtedly the most frightening thing to occur on American soil since the Civil War.”

Infowars, the conspiracy-minded site founded by Alex Jones, also published a story on Jade Helm 15, calling it a plan for the “brutal martial law takeover of America [that] labels Texas and Utah as ‘hostile’ states due to their strong cultural identities.”

Social media has escalated the tin-foil hat revolution. Baseless, fact-lacking garbage is multiplied a million-fold with the click of a mouse. When reading the latest drivel, every person has to wonder what truth lies behind the sensationalism. For once I’ve had a front row seat to the malicious nature of shock journalism.

Fifteen years of my law enforcement career were spent on the Midland County Sheriff’s Office SWAT Team. My last five years on the team were spent as commander before I transferred to the District Attorney’s Office. I’ve worked in or with many government entities in police and military capacity at state, local and federal levels. My experience is that most government failure is the result of incompetence, complacency or indifference; all of which make a successful far-reaching conspiracy almost impossible.

Around 1998 our team received two M113 Armored Personnel Carriers from the military’s 1033 program. The current conspiracy theory is that these vehicles are to be used against civilians in a massive sweep to move the population into death camps. I never received any orders to take people to death camps, but we did deploy the vehicles in several high-risk situations. My team and its command consisted of very strong, proud patriots so I didn’t have much concern about their part in a world-domination plot. By providing smaller agencies with gear like the M113, the government has reduced the dependence of local police upon state or federal tactical assistance; which is the exact opposite of the alleged conspiracy. Further discredit of the 1033 foil hat theory is fodder for another blog post.

Who is old enough to remember Y2K? I remember it well (translation: i’m old).

Y2K is an acronym for “Year 2000,” or, as it was also known – “The Year 2000 problem, the Y2K problem, the Millennium bug, the Y2K bug, or simply Y2K.” (source) It was the moment when the clocks struck 12:00 AM on Janury 1, 2000 and how it might affect every aspect of our lives. Why?

The year 2000 was a problem for many computers because many computer programs stored years using only the last two digits of the year; for example, 1980 was stored as “80”, the year 1999 was stored as “99” and the year 2000 would be stored as “00”.

Do you see the problem? Not only did such systems view the year 2000 as “00”, but they also viewed the year 1900 as “00”. Imagine what would happen to half your programs if your computer suddenly thought the current year (2013) was actually the year 1913. Your calendar program, your watch, your smart phone and many other programs we rely on would suddenly be all wacked out. Imagine what would happen to the banking system if this glitch occurred. Would you be able to access your money? Would all your checks suddenly bounce? (On the other hand, maybe the banks would suddenly give us 100 years of accrued interest. But i digress …)

Now imagine if such a glitch were to occur in bigger systems like nuclear electric plants and nuclear weapons? What might go wrong? This is what had a lot of people in a near state of panic.

Would telephone systems shutdown? Would the electric grid turn off across the country – plunging all of us into darkness for an indeterminant amount of time? Would trains run on schedule? Would the air traffic control system lose control? Would our nuclear arsenal behave in some unpredicted manner and cause WWIII? Would the nuclear arsenal in some other country malfunction and bomb us?

It seemed nobody knew for sure what would – or would not – happen. People were concerned and scared.

Enter my favorite moron – Alex Jones.

On New Year’s Eve 1999, the night the clocks were due to change over to the year 2000, The Alex Jones show engaged in some of the most negligent, egregious and irresponsible scare mongering ever. I don’t know of a worse case than this.

In the 3 hours Jones was on the air, he made every conceivable claim of catastrophe imaginable. He took everything people were fearing about Y2K and he claimed those fears were materializing. Everything from cash machines failing, nuclear power plants shutting down, concentration camps (with shackles) being readied, empty grocery store shelves, gas stations out of gas, Martial Law declared, the military serving search warrants in 77 Texas counties – to an actual nuclear missile attack!!!!!!!!

And did any of this actually occur? No. None of it. People were so frightened they reportedly headed for the hills (literally) and got physically sick.

Bill Cooper’s original broadcast was 3 hours long. In the Alex Jones recording i present below, except for the opening 30 seconds, i have edited out all of Bill Cooper’s narratives so you can hear Alex Jones uninterrupted in all his despicable glory.

As i was going through the audio, i noticed breaks in the Alex Jones audio that i assume were done by Bill Cooper’s editing team in preparation for broadcast. Where ever i believed there was an edit i added a half-second “beep” sound. This is to help avoid confusion as the conversation would sometimes abruptly change topics. So listen for the beeps (you can’t miss them).

Below the audio you will find a complete transcript of notes i made of what to expect in the audio. This will help you follow along. Where ever you see the word “Regurgitation,” that is my own shorthand to indicate it is a previously mentioned point being repeated by Jones – a tactic he uses to give the impression he has a pile of information. Any words [inside brackets] are commentaries i made for myself.

Believe me, this is an audio clip Alex Jones wishes would go away.

Enjoy!

:)

Mason I. Bilderberg.

P.S. If anybody knows where i can find a copy of the full 3 hour Alex Jones Show from 12/31/1999 please let me know.

1:39 Pennsylvania nuclear plant (Limerick Generating Station) has been shut down [implied because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below]

1:49 The shelves (In TX) are empty of water and gas stations are running out of fuel

3:12 The government in Washington D.C. has set up a $50M command bunker that is hooked into FEMA and they can take over all the shortwave (radio), AM/FM radio stations and all television and other broadcast stations

3:34 The police and military [presumably nationwide] are on high alert

3:41 The military are highly visible [presumably in the streets]

3:45 Trains of military equipment moving into Austin, TX

3:53 The airport (Robert Mueller Airport) will be used as a massive holding facility [ala concentration camps]

6:00 They (Russia) have deployed their missiles and submarines against us (America).

6:09 Vladimir Putin, who just took over as Russian President, has “taken the codes off” Russia’s nuclear arsenal. (The Russian nuclear arsenal no longer requires a secret code to initiate a nuclear missile attack on America.)

6:25 Discussing America being hit with a nuclear first-strike and the ensuing annihilation.

7:27 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania Electric Company (PECO), Limerick Generating Station (here and here) was shutdown [presumably because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below].

7:38 Doesn’t challenge a caller paraphrasing (Colonel) Bo Gritz who said, that Russia said, if their (Russia) power goes out they will blame us and they (Russia) would set off their nuclear arsenal.

8:01 The Russians are threatening to nuke us every, single week.

8:25 Currencies around the world are plunging

8:39 Gas stations in America are out of gas

8:58 American’s are standing up as Russia threatens to attack us with nuclear weapons

9:02 Nuclear power plants are being shutdown

9:07 The military is “running around” with the police and the FBI saying terrorism is imminent [the takeover is beginning]

9:25 “They” have activated a powerful, cold war, radar system in the north pole region [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] that is affecting shortwave (radio)

9:46 Military traffic is EVERYWHERE

9:52 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems (presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack) and nuclear systems are up.

10:07 Fresno (California?) is blacked out, he (Jones) is off the internet

10:25 [Scare tactic, Survivalist Commercial]

11:03 “America is under siege right now.”

11:14 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

11:33 Egypt is having a run on the banks

11:45 Regurgitation: The power in Fresno (California?) is down, he is off the internet

11:50 Regurgitation: Cash machines and ATMs in Europe are having problems

12:03 Martial Law signs are posted on highway 65 in Arkansas by the Arkansas Transportation Department

21:18 There are “shackles on the ground, concreted into the ground” at Robert Mueller Airport – like a slave galley.

21:42 New Zealand is having power outages

21:57 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:33 Regurgitation: Vladimir Putin threatens to nuke us

22:50 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:55 The power is off in 8 different areas across the country

22:58 A lot of cable systems aren’t working

23:01 Satellites are down

23:09 “Minor fault (???) struck two nuclear power plants in Japan just seconds after the clock ticked into 2000 …”

23:25 Anybody near a nuclear power plant should pack up and go someplace else.

23:37 The store shelves are bare in Austin, TX.

23:43 Regurgitation: Gas is running out.

23:44 They’re announcing on the news that, “if you’re bad they’re going to put you in a … they’re going to bolt you to a pipe coming out of the ground at the airport (Robert Mueller Airport) in some cold hangar.”

24:04 “The military is serving search warrants now in 77 Texas counties.”

24:08 Regurgitation: “We got nuclear power plants shutting down.”

24:20 Regurgitation: The Russians are threatening to nuke us RIGHT NOW.

28:36 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

28:57 The night before (12/30/99), anything and everything on the flight line at Selfridge Air National Guard Base was put into the air and was constantly in the air. [i.e. The U.S. is preparing for a nuclear attack]

29:11 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] are turned on.

29:21 The Russians are not the only ones we need to be concerned about … we should worry about the Chinese too.

20:24 We also need to be worried about Germany.

29:58 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

Who is old enough to remember Y2K? I remember it well (translation: i’m old).

Y2K is an acronym for “Year 2000,” or, as it was also known – “The Year 2000 problem, the Y2K problem, the Millennium bug, the Y2K bug, or simply Y2K.” (source) It was the moment when the clocks struck 12:00 AM on Janury 1, 2000 and how it might affect every aspect of our lives. Why?

The year 2000 was a problem for many computers because many computer programs stored years using only the last two digits of the year; for example, 1980 was stored as “80”, the year 1999 was stored as “99” and the year 2000 would be stored as “00”.

Do you see the problem? Not only did such systems view the year 2000 as “00”, but they also viewed the year 1900 as “00”. Imagine what would happen to half your programs if your computer suddenly thought the current year (2013) was actually the year 1913. Your calendar program, your watch, your smart phone and many other programs we rely on would suddenly be all wacked out. Imagine what would happen to the banking system if this glitch occurred. Would you be able to access your money? Would all your checks suddenly bounce? (On the other hand, maybe the banks would suddenly give us 100 years of accrued interest. But i digress …)

Now imagine if such a glitch were to occur in bigger systems like nuclear electric plants and nuclear weapons? What might go wrong? This is what had a lot of people in a near state of panic.

Would telephone systems shutdown? Would the electric grid turn off across the country – plunging all of us into darkness for an indeterminant amount of time? Would trains run on schedule? Would the air traffic control system lose control? Would our nuclear arsenal behave in some unpredicted manner and cause WWIII? Would the nuclear arsenal in some other country malfunction and bomb us?

It seemed nobody knew for sure what would – or would not – happen. People were concerned and scared.

Enter my favorite moron – Alex Jones.

On New Year’s Eve 1999, the night the clocks were due to change over to the year 2000, The Alex Jones show engaged in some of the most negligent, egregious and irresponsible scare mongering ever. I don’t know of a worse case than this.

In the 3 hours Jones was on the air, he made every conceivable claim of catastrophe imaginable. He took everything people were fearing about Y2K and he claimed those fears were materializing. Everything from cash machines failing, nuclear power plants shutting down, concentration camps (with shackles) being readied, empty grocery store shelves, gas stations out of gas, Martial Law declared, the military serving search warrants in 77 Texas counties – to an actual nuclear missile attack!!!!!!!!

And did any of this actually occur? No. None of it. People were so frightened they reportedly headed for the hills (literally) and got physically sick.

Bill Cooper’s original broadcast was 3 hours long. In the Alex Jones recording i present below, except for the opening 30 seconds, i have edited out all of Bill Cooper’s narratives so you can hear Alex Jones uninterrupted in all his despicable glory.

As i was going through the audio, i noticed breaks in the Alex Jones audio that i assume were done by Bill Cooper’s editing team in preparation for broadcast. Where ever i believed there was an edit i added a half-second “beep” sound. This is to help avoid confusion as the conversation would sometimes abruptly change topics. So listen for the beeps (you can’t miss them).

Below the audio you will find a complete transcript of notes i made of what to expect in the audio. This will help you follow along. Where ever you see the word “Regurgitation,” that is my own shorthand to indicate it is a previously mentioned point being repeated by Jones – a tactic he uses to give the impression he has a pile of information. Any words [inside brackets] are commentaries i made for myself.

Believe me, this is an audio clip Alex Jones wishes would go away.

Enjoy!

:)

Mason I. Bilderberg.

P.S. If anybody knows where i can find a copy of the full 3 hour Alex Jones Show from 12/31/1999 please let me know.

1:39 Pennsylvania nuclear plant (Limerick Generating Station) has been shut down [implied because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below]

1:49 The shelves (In TX) are empty of water and gas stations are running out of fuel

3:12 The government in Washington D.C. has set up a $50M command bunker that is hooked into FEMA and they can take over all the shortwave (radio), AM/FM radio stations and all television and other broadcast stations

3:34 The police and military [presumably nationwide] are on high alert

3:41 The military are highly visible [presumably in the streets]

3:45 Trains of military equipment moving into Austin, TX

3:53 The airport (Robert Mueller Airport) will be used as a massive holding facility [ala concentration camps]

6:00 They (Russia) have deployed their missiles and submarines against us (America).

6:09 Vladimir Putin, who just took over as Russian President, has “taken the codes off” Russia’s nuclear arsenal. (The Russian nuclear arsenal no longer requires a secret code to initiate a nuclear missile attack on America.)

6:25 Discussing America being hit with a nuclear first-strike and the ensuing annihilation.

7:27 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania Electric Company (PECO), Limerick Generating Station (here and here) was shutdown [presumably because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below].

7:38 Doesn’t challenge a caller paraphrasing (Colonel) Bo Gritz who said, that Russia said, if their (Russia) power goes out they will blame us and they (Russia) would set off their nuclear arsenal.

8:01 The Russians are threatening to nuke us every, single week.

8:25 Currencies around the world are plunging

8:39 Gas stations in America are out of gas

8:58 American’s are standing up as Russia threatens to attack us with nuclear weapons

9:02 Nuclear power plants are being shutdown

9:07 The military is “running around” with the police and the FBI saying terrorism is imminent [the takeover is beginning]

9:25 “They” have activated a powerful, cold war, radar system in the north pole region [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] that is affecting shortwave (radio)

9:46 Military traffic is EVERYWHERE

9:52 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems (presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack) and nuclear systems are up.

10:07 Fresno (California?) is blacked out, he (Jones) is off the internet

10:25 [Scare tactic, Survivalist Commercial]

11:03 “America is under siege right now.”

11:14 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

11:33 Egypt is having a run on the banks

11:45 Regurgitation: The power in Fresno (California?) is down, he is off the internet

11:50 Regurgitation: Cash machines and ATMs in Europe are having problems

12:03 Martial Law signs are posted on highway 65 in Arkansas by the Arkansas Transportation Department

21:18 There are “shackles on the ground, concreted into the ground” at Robert Mueller Airport – like a slave galley.

21:42 New Zealand is having power outages

21:57 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:33 Regurgitation: Vladimir Putin threatens to nuke us

22:50 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:55 The power is off in 8 different areas across the country

22:58 A lot of cable systems aren’t working

23:01 Satellites are down

23:09 “Minor fault (???) struck two nuclear power plants in Japan just seconds after the clock ticked into 2000 …”

23:25 Anybody near a nuclear power plant should pack up and go someplace else.

23:37 The store shelves are bare in Austin, TX.

23:43 Regurgitation: Gas is running out.

23:44 They’re announcing on the news that, “if you’re bad they’re going to put you in a … they’re going to bolt you to a pipe coming out of the ground at the airport (Robert Mueller Airport) in some cold hangar.”

24:04 “The military is serving search warrants now in 77 Texas counties.”

24:08 Regurgitation: “We got nuclear power plants shutting down.”

24:20 Regurgitation: The Russians are threatening to nuke us RIGHT NOW.

28:36 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

28:57 The night before (12/30/99), anything and everything on the flight line at Selfridge Air National Guard Base was put into the air and was constantly in the air. [i.e. The U.S. is preparing for a nuclear attack]

29:11 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] are turned on.

29:21 The Russians are not the only ones we need to be concerned about … we should worry about the Chinese too.

20:24 We also need to be worried about Germany.

29:58 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

Hello initiates and welcome to module one of the Illumicorp video training course. I would like to officially welcome you as a member of the team.

You’ve joined our organization at perhaps the most exciting point in our long history. Our founders shared a passionate dream. To transform this country, and eventually the whole world to one cohesive organization.

This presentation is designed to enlighten you about our organization’s goals and achievements. As your guide, I will help to answer some basic questions you might have about Illumicorp, and familiarize you with the valuable role you will play in helping us reach our prime objective. So please, take a tour with me as we march together towards an exciting new world.

New from the “Wow, You People Really Get Upset About Everything, Don’t You?” department, we have a conspiracy theorist who thinks that the Evil Government Agents are marking our mailboxes with color-coded dots for some ominous purpose.

The dots, which are about three inches across, are either bright red, blue, or yellow. And according to the aforementioned wackmobile, the whole idea is so that they can keep track of who is headed for termination:

More and more people are reporting their mail box or their house has been marked with color stickers or marks. Are these the FEMA death camp markings for foreign troops to gather us when the government declares martial law? In some area, even the local police & utility companies don’t even know why they are there.

Minister Paul shows us how FEMA is marking his mailbox.

He then follows it up with a couple of videos, showing his mailbox and a neighbor’s mailbox that have stickers. And lo, one of them was red and one of them was blue, as was foretold by the prophecy. Worse still, one of the mailboxes had the lock forced. He talked to a guy at the post office, who said that the blue sticker meant that there was a forwarding order on that address. The guy who made the video, who calls himself “Master Paul,” draws from this the following breathtaking conclusion:

If blue means “forward,” why is (the neighbor’s) red? There are a lot of conspiracy theories on YouTube. This is not a conspiracy theory. You’re seeing it. Red and blue!

Yup. We saw it. Red and blue. And therefore FEMA death camps and martial law and public floggings of American citizens, or something.

To hammer home the point, we’re shown the following map, illustrating where stickered mailboxes have been reported to Master Paul et al.:

If there is a group of people I hate arguing with even more than I hate arguing with young-earth creationists, it’s the conspiracy theorists.

At least the young-earth creationists just think I’m working for Satan, a charge that I can understand, considering their view of things. Sure, we don’t accept the same ground rules for proof (evidence versus revelation); sure, we have different conclusions regarding where you can apply the laws of scientific inference (damn near everywhere versus only places where it doesn’t conflict with Holy Writ).

But at least we can talk. The conspiracy theorists, you can’t even have a civil discussion with. They accuse you of either being stupid or else working for evil humans, both of which are in my opinion worse than working for Satan because stupidity and evil humans actually exist. The worst part, though, is that they pretend to accept the principles of rational argument, but then when it comes down to the point, they don’t, really. You can bring out the best-researched study about the efficacy and safety of vaccines, the most convincing argument that 9/11 and Sandy Hook were not “inside jobs” or “false flags,” the most persuasive evidence out there that HAARP has nothing to do with raising tsunamis or causing earthquakes.

And where does it get you? They just write you off as a dupe or a shill. It’s the ultimate example of the False Dilemma Fallacy; if you don’t agree with us, you’re one of…. Them.

The problem in this country has gotten so bad that Kurt Eichenwald did a big piece in Vanity Fair on the topic this week, and you all should read it. In fact, everyone in the civilized world should read it, because it’s brilliant, even though it’s depressing. I’ll give you a brief passage from it, but then I want you to go to the link and read the whole thing:

(W)e have become scientific and political illiterates, and no nation can survive on a bedrock of such delusional stupidity. Of course, the 26 percent (or more) won’t believe me, if they manage to read this. I’ll just be deemed an “elitist” for daring to suggest that demon science and data, rather than ridiculous conspiracy theories, should be used to judge reality. So, it may be a losing battle, but we should all try. I don’t want to be forced, someday, to stand by as the rest of the world renames our nation “America the Ignorant.”

It’s a bit of a coincidence that I should come across this when I did, because it came on the heels of another article, one sent to me by a loyal reader of Skeptophilia, that details one of the most pervasive and bizarre conspiracy theories out there: that the US government in general, and FEMA (the Federal Emergency Management Agency) in particular, are laying plans to kill us all.

Code ICD 9 E 978 Makes Execution by Guillotine Legal Under Obamacare. The specific code sent to me will make any American’s hair stand up on the back of their neck. The code is ICD 9 E 978. After reading this code I decided that it was my duty to investigate further and get to the bottom of why we have a medical code in the United States for “Legal Execution.” The Jesuits are behind most conspiracies and this one is no different… Execution by Guillotine is painless.

And I’m thinking: what the fuck does Obamacare have to do with this? Was that just something extra to throw in, along with the Jesuits for some reason, the way that the anti-GMO crowd will throw in the name “Monsanto” as a stand-in for Hitler?

At least they tossed us the cheerful tidbit that getting your head sliced off is painless. I’m relieved, actually, considering what other methods they could have chosen.

Astrophysicists talk about the process of accretion, where microscopic particles of dust and ice stick together (largely through electrostatic attraction), leading to the formation of disks of matter around the parent star than can eventually form planets. As the clumps of dust get larger, so does their gravitational attraction to nearby clumps — so they grow, and grow, and grow.

Conspiracy theories also grow by accretion.

One person notices one thing — very likely something natural, accidental, minor, insignificant — and points it out. Others begin to notice other, similar phenomena, and stick those to the original observation, whether or not there is any real connection. And as the number of accreted ideas grows, so does the likelihood of attracting other ideas, and soon you have a full-blown gas giant of craziness.

The whole chemtrail conspiracy theory nonsense began with some dew in a glazed ceramic bowl and a reporter that failed math class.

It seems to be, for example, how the whole nonsense about “chemtrails” started. A reporter for KSLA News (Shreveport, Louisiana) in 2007 was investigating a report of “an unusually persistent jet contrail,” and found that a man in the area had “collected dew in bowls” after he saw the contrail. The station had the water in the bowls analyzed, and reported that it contained 6.8 parts per million of the heavy metal barium — dangerously high concentrations. The problem is, the reporter got the concentration wrong by a factor of a hundred — it was 68 parts per billion, which is right in the normal range for water from natural sources (especially water collected in a glazed ceramic bowl, because ceramic glazes often contain barium as a flux). But the error was overlooked, or (worse) explained away post hoc as a government coverup. The barium was at dangerous concentrations, people said. And it came from the contrail. Which might contain all sorts of other things that they’re not telling you about.

And thus were “chemtrails” born.

It seems like in the last couple of months, we’re seeing the birth of a new conspiracy theory, as if we needed another one. Back in 2011, I started seeing stories about the Yellowstone Supervolcano, and how we were “overdue for an eruption” (implying that volcanoes operate on some kind of timetable). At first, it was just in dubiously reliable places like LiveScience, but eventually other, better sources got involved, probably as a reaction to people demanding information on what seemed like a dire threat. No, the geologists said, there’s no cause for worry. There’s no indication that the caldera is going to erupt any time soon. Yes, the place is geologically active, venting steam and gases, but there is no particular reason to be alarmed, because volcanoes do that.

Then, last month, we had people who panicked when they saw a video clip of bison running about, and became convinced that the bison had sensed an eruption coming and were “fleeing the park in terror.” And once again, we had to speak soothingly to the panicked individuals, reassuring them that bison are prone to roaming about even when not prompted to do so by a volcano (cf. the lyrics to “Home on the Range,” wherein the singer wishes for “a home where the buffalo roam,” despite the fact that such a home would probably face animal dander issues on a scale even we dog owners can’t begin to imagine).

But the accretion wasn’t done yet. The bison were too running from the volcano, people said. So were the elk. And then the real crazies got involved, and said that the government was already beginning to evacuate people from a wide region around Yellowstone, and relocating them to FEMA camps where they are cut off from communicating with anyone. And when there was an explosion and fire at a gas processing plant in Opal, Wyoming two weeks ago, 150 miles from Yellowstone, and the whole town was evacuated, the conspiracy theorists went nuts. This is it, they said. It’s starting. The government is getting people out, because they know the whole freakin’ place is going to explode.

In Skeptoid Episode #364, Brian made a statement regarding conspiracy theories that I’ve since used many times in my continued battle against tinfoil-helmeted nonsense. It’s simple, direct, and 100% true:

No conspiracy theory has ever been proven true.

A less-elegant and wordier way to say this is that there has never been a popularly held conspiracy theory, ie, a non-evidenced belief that a group of powerful people secretly worked together to do something harmful, that later had compelling evidence to prove that said conspiracy was real.

Don’t think too hard about it, little guy.

Whenever I use this argument in social media, I’m invariably sent one of about half a dozen different internet listicles that attempt to prove me wrong by going through a number of conspiracies or conspiracy theories that were later proven to be real. One is a really long slog from Infowars. Another is from Cracked. There are still others from Listverse, Style Slides and True Activist.

What much of the content on these lists, as well as those who send them to me, get wrong on a pretty consistent basis is that there is a difference between a conspiracy and a conspiracy theory. Conspiracies are real, and many of them have been proven conclusively to have taken place at all times throughout history. Some of these include the conspiracy to assassinate Abraham Lincoln, the conspiracy to assassinate Adolf Hitler (the so-called July 20th plot), the conspiracy to throw the 1919 World Series, American tobacco companies conspiring to suppress scientific research that painted their products as harmful, and so on. All of these are real and none of them are theories.

Likewise, things like 9/11 being an inside job, JFK being shot by multiple gunmen, chemtrails, the existence of an all-powerful New World Order, FEMA camps and any number of banking and currency related plots are all conspiracy theories. That is to say, they are all theories that a conspiracy took place – and most have little to no evidence supporting those theories.

Not only is there a difference between a conspiracy and a conspiracy theory, there are all manner of reasons why people would “conspire” about something – and they’re not all bad or harmful. There are perfectly legitimate reasons why a government or corporation would want to keep something secret, whether it’s a patented technology, proprietary research or a sensitive national security matter. Like it or not, not everyone gets to know everything.

With all of this in mind, I want to take a look at one of the lists I’ve been sent a couple of times. It’s representative of the general tone and content of the other lists, and has the added advantage of being from a reputable source, Business Insider. This is a good example of a list of “conspiracies” that is not a list of conspiracy theories, and isn’t even all “conspiracies.”

That’s a lot of qualifiers. To be on this list, the plot has to be huge (whatever that means), driven by the government, and proven to be a conspiracy that with compelling evidence to support its existence.

1. The U.S. Department of the Treasury poisoned alcohol during Prohibition — and people died.

This is completely true. The Treasury, in its capacity to enforce the Volstead Act, added deadly chemicals to the industrial alcohol that was being used by bootleggers as a substitute for grain alcohol. While the poisoning became public knowledge very quickly, over 1,000 people still died in New York alone, thanks to this true conspiracy.

2. The U.S. Public Health Service lied about treating black men with syphilis for more than 40 years.

Another true conspiracy, and one that the CDC openly acknowledges – making up for decades of knowingly sickening hundreds of poor black men. But even during the heyday of the experiment, it was never a popularly discussed theory, and it’s been public knowledge for four decades.

3. More than 100 million Americans received a polio vaccine contaminated with a potentially cancer-causing virus.

Here’s a perfect example of something that’s not a conspiracy, certainly not a government conspiracy and not even true. The Business Insider piece relies on debunked testimony from anti-vaxxer Barbara Loe Fisher to back up the pseudoscience claim that millions of doses of Jonas Salk’s original formulation of the polio vaccine contained the “cancer causing virus” SV40. But no compelling evidence exists that SV40 actually causes any harm in humans (SV stands for simian virus), and virtually every source that makes this claim is strongly anti-vaccination.

The author of the BI piece is either anti-vaccine or fell for anti-vaccine propaganda.

4. Parts of the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, which led to U.S. intervention in Vietnam, never happened.

USS Maddox in action against North Vietnamese torpedo boats (navy.mil)

This would indeed be a “huge government conspiracy” if it were true. As I wrote about in my piece on false flag attacks, the Gulf of Tonkin Incident was actually two separate attacks on a US destroyer by North Vietnamese torpedo boats in August 1964. The first was an actual attack, with bullet holes in both the destroyer Maddox and the North Vietnamese boats to prove it.

The second was theorized even at the time to be a phantom attack, featuring jittery US sailors shooting at shadows. While we now know that this “attack” didn’t happen, there was a tremendous amount of confusion in the White House shortly afterwards, and subsequent tapes show President Johnson openly wondering what happened. It could be argued that there was a conspiracy to make the Incident fit the Johnson administration’s desire to expand US involvement in Vietnam, that’s a conspiracy of a different color.

The internet is awash with reports of government agencies stockpiling weapons and medical supplies in the face of looming domestic unrest — but is there any truth behind the rumors? Why do some people believe the U.S. is preparing for civil war?

Hello initiates and welcome to module one of the Illumicorp video training course. I would like to officially welcome you as a member of the team.

You’ve joined our organization at perhaps the most exciting point in our long history. Our founders shared a passionate dream. To transform this country, and eventually the whole world to one cohesive organization.

This presentation is designed to enlighten you about our organization’s goals and achievements. As your guide, I will help to answer some basic questions you might have about Illumicorp, and familiarize you with the valuable role you will play in helping us reach our prime objective. So please, take a tour with me as we march together towards an exciting new world.

Had enough government rhetoric? Tired of following the sheeple? Fed up with believing what THEY want you to believe? Maybe it’s time to branch out and discover THE TRUTH.

If you’re new to the exciting world of conspiracy theories and just can’t decide which paranoid delusion best suits you, then why not use this handy flowchart to find your ideal conspiracy theory. Then you too can go and stick it to THE MAN.

(Click image for larger view)

Click image for larger view

“You know, this explains a lot. Because all my life, I’ve had this unaccountable feeling in my bones that something sinister was happening in the universe and that no one would tell me what it was.” Arthur Dent

NB This is not intended to be a complete list, but please don’t let that stop you commenting to let me know what I’ve missed off :)

The claim: Jim Creek, Oso, ?What it really is: The Jim Creek Naval Radio Station is a Navy very low frequency (VLF) radio transmitter facility. The facility has one building, and the area itself is also used as a outdoor recreational area for Naval personnel and their families and guests.

The claim: Keyport, ?What it really is: The Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Keyport is one of two of the Navy’s undersea warfare facilities, and employs around 1,300 civilian workers.

The base also has it’s own museum, and while there are several large buildings there, none of them appear to be something you would find in a prison camp. Infact they look mostly like industrial buildings.

The facility itself is surround by the city of Brenton, and there is very little room for where it can expand into, and most of the buildings that are there are nothing you wouldn’t find in a facility such as this.

The claim: Everett, ?What it really is: Naval Station Everett is a relatively young Navy base (it became active in 1994) and is the home to several ships, including the USS Nimitz.

The base itself isn’t actually on to much land, and none of the buildings there look like nothing you wouldn’t find on your typical Navy base. Plus, if there was a prison camp being built there it would be unlikely it could be kept out of public view due to the fact that the city Everett is right next to the base.

On January 30th, as the South and East of the US were shaking off the effects of a monster cold wave (the second major storm that month, in fact) videos starting popping up on YouTube purporting that the snow that had fallen in said storm was not snow at all, but actually a synthetic chemical spray meant to look like snow, but delivered via artificial weather for evil purposes.

The videos, dozens of them in all, had titles like “Georgia Fake Snow!!!” and “FAKE SNOW being Reported all over the U.S. SINCE WHEN DOES SNOW TURN BLACK????” and “Fake Snow that won’t melt is really Nanobots 2014.” Soon, regular conspiracy blogs like Before It’s News ran with it. What these clips showed was, admittedly, pretty strange. People would go outside, grab a handful of snow, ball it up, take it back inside, take a lighter to it…and it didn’t melt. Instead, it turned black. And the video-makers complained of a plastic smell.

This chemical-laden, non-burning, plastic “snow” could only be nefarious geoengineering at work, a New World Order false flag attempt to control our climate and our minds and our freedom through HAARP and the chemtrails that the globalist controllers and their minions relentlessly spray around the world and around the clock, all designed to keep us docile and slumbering sheeple who won’t question being sickened and fattened and loaded down with toxins and GMOs and vaccines and toxic GMO vaccines and false flags and crisis actors and Agenda 21 and propaganda and aspartame and Monsanto and all of it ending with a guillotine blade and a plastic tub AND A FEMA DEATH CAMP!!!!! AHHGGHHHH!!! RUN!!! OPEN YOUR EYES!!! DO YOUR RESEARCH!!!!

Or, you know, it’s science.

Really, really basic science.

Mick West, the chemtrail skeptic who founded metabunk.org jumped on this nonsense right away, and posted a simple, really sound explanation for why the snow in the videos blackened and didn’t turn into water. I’ll quote it here:

A) The snow is melting, but the very loose fluffy structure of the snow wicks away the water, turning dry snow into wet snow, and eventually turning the snow into slush.

B) The snow is blackened when a lighter is held underneath it because of the soot from the lighter (the products of incomplete combustion). It’s not burning.

C) The smell is fumes from the lighter (also from incomplete combustion) and/or people briefly burning nearby objects like gloves.

So, there you go. Other than being a pretty good example of why basic science education is so important, these videos show nothing even remotely unusual.

Recently the old FEMA camp myth has once again reared it’s ugly head around internet, this time making it appear that President Obama has ordered $1,000,000,000 worth of “disposable coffins”, as you can clearly see from this screen shot below:

The Internet is full of diabolical conspiracy theories. One of the most enduring is the existence of 800 plus Federal Emergency Management Agency prison camps, scattered across the country, awaiting the arrival of the New World Order. This theory is sadly ironic since the FEMA’s mission is to help citizens during natural disasters.

YouTube lists dozens of related videos purporting to show these camps. One video is represented as a FEMA concentration camp in Ohio, complete with a crematorium. The narrator states it is near a major metropolitan area, but he inexplicably fails to give the exact location. One particularly outrageous rumor tells of a FEMA camp in Alaska large enough to hold 2 million prisoners. This is about three times the population of Alaska.

A related conspiracy theory is about colored adhesive stickers placed on residential mailboxes. The color is all-important. Upon the arrival of unspecified foreign troops to enforce the New World Order, the color of the sticker would determine the treatment of the occupants of the home. Red means that the occupants of the home are opponents of the government and will be shot immediately. Blue means the occupants have similar beliefs as the red group, but are not nearly as dangerous. They will be sent to a FEMA concentration camp. A yellow sticker means that the occupants would welcome the New World Order and the accompanying socialism.

The question remains as to the real source of the mailbox stickers. The truth is they are used by service people as a convenient method of customer identification.

Step 1: Start with the premise that any tragic incident is a massive, intricate government conspiracy.

Step 2: Denounce any information presented by a mainstream, non-conspiracy source that directly counters the predetermined conspiracy narrative as corrupt and part of the conspiracy.

Step 3: Monitor these same mainstream sources for information that supports the predetermined conspiracy narrative, even if only remotely. Mainstream media reporting mistakes that support your conspiracy (or any conspiracy really) must be treated as rare moments of truth, glimpses inside the Matrix. Any mainstream media reports in favor of the conspiracy should be treated like the word of God. Spam that information everywhere.

Step 4: Imagination is the same thing as undeniable fact. There is nothing wrong with manipulating Youtube videos and using Photoshop to edit information to make it more obvious for the stupid sheeple to understand.

Step 5: Reject the skeptics to the conspiracy theories aggressively. Call them out for being sheep, shills, Cointelpro, paid agents, et cetera. Do not ever doubt yourself, because if you think they are any of these nouns, then it is undeniably true. After all, the conspiracy theory you are trying to wake the world up to is a fact. Only a sheep would think otherwise.

Step 6: Bring up the founding of the Federal Reserve, the Bay of Pigs, The Gulf of Tonkin, and other well known deceptive schemes by the government often (every conversation if need be.) These actions were confessed by government, therefore every other conspiracy theory is true!

Step 7: Cite declassified documents often, as they are invaluable. If the government reports that a secret program was started and ended 60 years ago- DO NOT BELIEVE THEM. The secret programs for sure are still occurring and are now more massive, sinister, and successful than before.

Step 8: Remember that most of witnesses and victims involved in conspiracy event are actors. Medical examiners, emergency responders, the police, reporters, they are almost all in on it. The innocent people caught up in the conspiracy were either killed or have been threatened by the conspirators and are too afraid to come forward (or they possibly never existed to begin with.)

Step 9: Blitz the world with the truth until everyone deletes you on Facebook or you are banned from your favorite web sites. Lay low for a period, regroup at your favorite alternative web sites, get encouragement and reinforcement from the other awakened truth seekers, and start the process all over again with a new conspiracy.

Who is old enough to remember Y2K? I remember it well (translation: i’m old).

Y2K is an acronym for “Year 2000,” or, as it was also known – “The Year 2000 problem, the Y2K problem, the Millennium bug, the Y2K bug, or simply Y2K.” (source) It was the moment when the clocks struck 12:00 AM on Janury 1, 2000 and how it might affect every aspect of our lives. Why?

The year 2000 was a problem for many computers because many computer programs stored years using only the last two digits of the year; for example, 1980 was stored as “80”, the year 1999 was stored as “99” and the year 2000 would be stored as “00”.

Do you see the problem? Not only did such systems view the year 2000 as “00”, but they also viewed the year 1900 as “00”. Imagine what would happen to half your programs if your computer suddenly thought the current year (2013) was actually the year 1913. Your calendar program, your watch, your smart phone and many other programs we rely on would suddenly be all wacked out. Imagine what would happen to the banking system if this glitch occurred. Would you be able to access your money? Would all your checks suddenly bounce? (On the other hand, maybe the banks would suddenly give us 100 years of accrued interest. But i digress …)

Now imagine if such a glitch were to occur in bigger systems like nuclear electric plants and nuclear weapons? What might go wrong? This is what had a lot of people in a near state of panic.

Would telephone systems shutdown? Would the electric grid turn off across the country – plunging all of us into darkness for an indeterminant amount of time? Would trains run on schedule? Would the air traffic control system lose control? Would our nuclear arsenal behave in some unpredicted manner and cause WWIII? Would the nuclear arsenal in some other country malfunction and bomb us?

It seemed nobody knew for sure what would – or would not – happen. People were concerned and scared.

Enter my favorite moron – Alex Jones.

On New Year’s Eve 1999, the night the clocks were due to change over to the year 2000, The Alex Jones show engaged in some of the most negligent, egregious and irresponsible scare mongering ever. I don’t know of a worse case than this.

In the 3 hours Jones was on the air, he made every conceivable claim of catastrophe imaginable. He took everything people were fearing about Y2K and he claimed those fears were materializing. Everything from cash machines failing, nuclear power plants shutting down, concentration camps (with shackles) being readied, empty grocery store shelves, gas stations out of gas, Martial Law declared, the military serving search warrants in 77 Texas counties – to an actual nuclear missile attack!!!!!!!!

And did any of this actually occur? No. None of it. People were so frightened they reportedly headed for the hills (literally) and got physically sick.

Bill Cooper’s original broadcast was 3 hours long. In the Alex Jones recording i present below, except for the opening 30 seconds, i have edited out all of Bill Cooper’s narratives so you can hear Alex Jones uninterrupted in all his despicable glory.

As i was going through the audio, i noticed breaks in the Alex Jones audio that i assume were done by Bill Cooper’s editing team in preparation for broadcast. Where ever i believed there was an edit i added a half-second “beep” sound. This is to help avoid confusion as the conversation would sometimes abruptly change topics. So listen for the beeps (you can’t miss them).

Below the audio you will find a complete transcript of notes i made of what to expect in the audio. This will help you follow along. Where ever you see the word “Regurgitation,” that is my own shorthand to indicate it is a previously mentioned point being repeated by Jones – a tactic he uses to give the impression he has a pile of information. Any words [inside brackets] are commentaries i made for myself.

Believe me, this is an audio clip Alex Jones wishes would go away.

Enjoy!

:)

Mason I. Bilderberg.

P.S. If anybody knows where i can find a copy of the full 3 hour Alex Jones Show from 12/31/1999 please let me know.

1:39 Pennsylvania nuclear plant (Limerick Generating Station) has been shut down [implied because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below]

1:49 The shelves (In TX) are empty of water and gas stations are running out of fuel

3:12 The government in Washington D.C. has set up a $50M command bunker that is hooked into FEMA and they can take over all the shortwave (radio), AM/FM radio stations and all television and other broadcast stations

3:34 The police and military [presumably nationwide] are on high alert

3:41 The military are highly visible [presumably in the streets]

3:45 Trains of military equipment moving into Austin, TX

3:53 The airport (Robert Mueller Airport) will be used as a massive holding facility [ala concentration camps]

6:00 They (Russia) have deployed their missiles and submarines against us (America).

6:09 Vladimir Putin, who just took over as Russian President, has “taken the codes off” Russia’s nuclear arsenal. (The Russian nuclear arsenal no longer requires a secret code to initiate a nuclear missile attack on America.)

6:25 Discussing America being hit with a nuclear first-strike and the ensuing annihilation.

7:27 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania Electric Company (PECO), Limerick Generating Station (here and here) was shutdown [presumably because of Y2K-related problems. Not true. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) findings are contained in the image, below].

7:38 Doesn’t challenge a caller paraphrasing (Colonel) Bo Gritz who said, that Russia said, if their (Russia) power goes out they will blame us and they (Russia) would set off their nuclear arsenal.

8:01 The Russians are threatening to nuke us every, single week.

8:25 Currencies around the world are plunging

8:39 Gas stations in America are out of gas

8:58 American’s are standing up as Russia threatens to attack us with nuclear weapons

9:02 Nuclear power plants are being shutdown

9:07 The military is “running around” with the police and the FBI saying terrorism is imminent [the takeover is beginning]

9:25 “They” have activated a powerful, cold war, radar system in the north pole region [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] that is affecting shortwave (radio)

9:46 Military traffic is EVERYWHERE

9:52 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems (presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack) and nuclear systems are up.

10:07 Fresno (California?) is blacked out, he (Jones) is off the internet

10:25 [Scare tactic, Survivalist Commercial]

11:03 “America is under siege right now.”

11:14 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

11:33 Egypt is having a run on the banks

11:45 Regurgitation: The power in Fresno (California?) is down, he is off the internet

11:50 Regurgitation: Cash machines and ATMs in Europe are having problems

12:03 Martial Law signs are posted on highway 65 in Arkansas by the Arkansas Transportation Department

21:18 There are “shackles on the ground, concreted into the ground” at Robert Mueller Airport – like a slave galley.

21:42 New Zealand is having power outages

21:57 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:33 Regurgitation: Vladimir Putin threatens to nuke us

22:50 Regurgitation: Pennsylvania nuclear power plant shutdown

22:55 The power is off in 8 different areas across the country

22:58 A lot of cable systems aren’t working

23:01 Satellites are down

23:09 “Minor fault (???) struck two nuclear power plants in Japan just seconds after the clock ticked into 2000 …”

23:25 Anybody near a nuclear power plant should pack up and go someplace else.

23:37 The store shelves are bare in Austin, TX.

23:43 Regurgitation: Gas is running out.

23:44 They’re announcing on the news that, “if you’re bad they’re going to put you in a … they’re going to bolt you to a pipe coming out of the ground at the airport (Robert Mueller Airport) in some cold hangar.”

24:04 “The military is serving search warrants now in 77 Texas counties.”

24:08 Regurgitation: “We got nuclear power plants shutting down.”

24:20 Regurgitation: The Russians are threatening to nuke us RIGHT NOW.

28:36 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

28:57 The night before (12/30/99), anything and everything on the flight line at Selfridge Air National Guard Base was put into the air and was constantly in the air. [i.e. The U.S. is preparing for a nuclear attack]

29:11 Regurgitation: Super power, cold war radar systems [presumably to keep an eye out for a Russian ICBM attack] are turned on.

29:21 The Russians are not the only ones we need to be concerned about … we should worry about the Chinese too.

20:24 We also need to be worried about Germany.

29:58 Regurgitation: It’s on ABC news that 5 nuclear missiles have been launched.

Recently on a Facebook skeptics group that I belong to someone posted a very “curious” looking photo, along with the commentary by the person whom posted the photo somewhere else on Facebook:

Now the first thing that came to my mind when I saw that photo was, “Wow… that trailer needs a good wash.”

All joking aside of course what really came to my mind was that the words on the truck looked like it was put on there via digital photo manipulation (i.e. photoshopped) and even if it wasn’t, then so what?

Now my first argument for why it is photoshopped is because of another photo that looks almost exactly like the first one provided to me via Illuminutti.com:

Now clearly the second picture is photoshopped, and to be all honest it’s not even that good of a photoshop job either.

Of course just because the second photo has clearly been digitally manipulated, I have to admit that it does not mean that the first photo has been digitally manipulated as well. If you look closely at the bottom words “FEMA DISASTER RELIEF” that while the font style used for the letters are similar to the ones on the top, they are infact different.

If the first photo was photoshopped, the second photoshopped photo was probably done by someone else whom used the closest font style that they could find to the original words… unless the person whom created the original photo forgot the original font style that they used.

Now another reason why I think the photo has been digitally manipulated is because of the trailer itself.

Besides just being in need of a good wash, it is clearly a used trailer due to the fact that there is a company logo right next to “FEMA DISASTER RELIEF”, as well as a logo on the truck that is pulling the trailer.

So if this photo was real, what it would tell me isn’t that FEMA is planning on “something” evil, it’s that they’re moving a trailer from one location to another to another, probably for some bureaucratic reasons, or it’s being driven around just to make sure that everything is okay with it and the truck that’s pulling it (and before you point out that the person claims that it’s coming from a FBI building in Virginia I should like to point out that I don’t take such claims seriously unless I have more proof that it really did come from a FBI building in Virginia).

Also, if the photo is real then it tells me is that FEMA is pretty underfunded if the only big rigs they can afford to buy are used and can’t be washed every so often due to funding…

There is an internet radio broadcast called The Bob Charles Show that broadcasts 5 days a week at various times.

I mention this show because i’m having fun sifting through their audio archive listening to some of the craziest conspiratorial-woo crap you’ll find anywhere. This is pure entertainment. Where else can you find this kind of rambling nonsense?

To whet your appetite, below is an excerpt from the 11/10/13 The Bob Charles Show that i had transcribed.

Do note, i have highlighted every instance where these conspiracists use the catch-all, abstract phrase “they” to reference the faceless, nameless matrix masters.

Conspiracists are notorious for blaming “them” or “they” for every woe, unanswered question or mystery in the world.

You want to piss off a conspiracist? When they refer to “they,” ask them who “they” are. Two days ago a conspiracist told me “they” were the FBI, NSA, CIA, etc. I asked him to stop blaming buildings and get more specific (Who? What? When? Where?). He went nuts. To him i was suddenly one of “them.”

If you hear “they,” ask for specific names, dates and locations. Who (specifically) talked to who (specifically)? Who (specifically) is a member of the illuminati? Who (specifically) within the NSA? Who (specifically) within the government? Who (specifically) within the pharmaceutical industry? Who (specifically)?

No more blaming buildings and talking in abstract concepts about nameless, faceless people.

And yet, as Slate’s Jeremy Stahl points out, millions of Americans hold these beliefs. In a Zogby poll taken six years ago, only 64 percent of U.S. adults agreed that the attacks “caught US intelligence and military forces off guard.” More than 30 percent chose a different conclusion: that “certain elements in the US government knew the attacks were coming but consciously let them proceed for various political, military, and economic motives,” or that these government elements “actively planned or assisted some aspects of the attacks.”

How can this be? How can so many people, in the name of skepticism, promote so many absurdities?

The answer is that people who suspect conspiracies aren’t really skeptics. Like the rest of us, they’re selective doubters. They favor a worldview, which they uncritically defend. But their worldview isn’t about God, values, freedom, or equality. It’s about the omnipotence of elites.

Conspiracy chatter was once dismissed as mental illness. But the prevalence of such belief, documented in surveys, has forced scholars to take it more seriously. Conspiracy theory psychology is becoming an empirical field with a broader mission: to understand why so many people embrace this way of interpreting history. As you’d expect, distrust turns out to be an important factor. But it’s not the kind of distrust that cultivates critical thinking.

So i was having a written exchange with a couple of conspiracists. They were posting links ranting on and on about FEMA camps, martial law, something about foreign troops being trained to disarm Americans . . . yada, yada, yada.

You know, the same old crap.

This whole conspiracy thing seems cyclical. A new generation of conspiracy theorists stumble upon the same old, worn out, decades old conspiracy theories for the first time in their paranoid lives and they think they’ve discovered something completely new, true and worth preaching. And so they begin their new mission – running around trying to wake up the “sheeple” to their new found “truth.”

These newly stamped conspiracists then go on to spend many years spinning their wheels in the same conspiratorial muck that their conspiratorial predecessors did all those decades before.

Some of these newbies will remain in the Lost Forest for many years – beyond the reach of reason. Then there are the newbies that wise up to the con(spiracy) money game being played on them by those reaping huge profits regurgitating the same old tales of paranoia – Alex Jones comes to mind.

Every conspiracy being preached today has been preached before in some shape or form. This is the point i try to make in my exchanges with my conspiratorial friends:

How urgent can your message be today if it’s the same “urgent” message that has been screamed for (at least) the last 15 years?

Can you continuously scream “FIRE!” for decades and be taken seriously when the fire has never materialized?

As an example of what i’m talking about i have posted some screenshots below that came from the InfoWars website, October 1999. Note the similarities to today’s InfoWar headlines. Same sh**, different year.

I’ll give Alex Jones credit for one thing – he has an amazing ability to sell and resell the same crap over and over again.

These are the kinds of links i get on my facebook page.The video description says, “Martial law ALERT This may be your final warning.” Really? Alex Jones has been giving us “final warnings” since (at least) 1999 (see below).

It’s happened to all of us. Some friend we had in elementary school or from an old job is all of a sudden making super weird comments on Facebook, or you’re in a bar and some random is trying to talk to you about fluoride for some reason. It’s not always immediately clear. Like, I realized one day that people saying crazy things were always following it up with “Do your own research!” and then finally discovered that it was sort of a “buzzphrase” for conspiracy theorists.

So, I thought I’d compile a list of the ways to know that someone in your life is starting to head down to tin foil hat alley.

1 • Says insane thing (probably about chemtrails), and if you dispute, insists that you “Do your own research!”

This is one of the earliest signs of this type of crazy- and it’s also a major Glenn Beck-ism. I don’t know about you, but when I state a fact, I’m usually able to explain that fact. Especially if it’s something that may be controversial.

For instance, I do not so much believe that Joan Crawford beat her children. This is a thing that most people believe, because of the movie “Mommie Dearest”– however, when asked to explain, I don’t yell “Do your own research!” at people, I explain that all of the other children (save for Christopher) have refuted Christina’s book, as well as Crawford’s actual personal assistant, and Myrna Loy, and pretty much anyone else who was around during that time. I’m not saying I’m 100% definitely correct on this, but I err on the side of “probably not.”

Still, I don’t throw out something weird, get mad at people for not immediately taking me at my word, and then yell at them to do their own research. I mean, if they want to, that’s fine, but I’m usually quite able to support my arguments.

2 • Freaking Flouride

UGH. These people and their fluoride. They love to make up crap about how the government puts fluoride in the water to keep us dumb and rebellion-resistant, like no one has ever seen “Dr. Strangelove” before or something. This is usually what they start with, probably because it sounds slightly more realistic than like, Lizard People.

It is not, however, true. At all. And yes, I’ve “done my research.” But don’t tell that to these people, especially if they are drunk at a bar, because they will, in fact, start screaming at you about it. Fluoride and the “vaccinations cause autism” thing are like the gateway drugs into tin-foil hat land.

3 • Rejecting the tyranny of paragraph breaks

I swear to god, this is a thing. Whenever I see a comment that’s just a giant block of text with no breaks in it, I immediately just go “Welp, this one’s gonna be crazy” and I am pretty much always right. I don’t know why this is a thing, it just is.

4 • When a person who you already kinda know isn’t too swift starts trying to pretend that they are some kind of intellectual who is totally going to school you on “how things are in the world.”

I hate to say this, but it’s true. It’s always the dumb ones. I feel bad, because like, they’re usually just coming across this stuff for the first time and it is totally blowing their minds. Like, I already know that some people think that the Rothschilds control the world and that there are Mason things on the dollar bill and also THE MOON LANDING WAS FAKED or whatever. I’ve known for years, and I’ve already figured out that it’s all bullshit.

The more you read about history, the more you realize that people are so not getting it together to form a whole “New World Order” anytime soon. While there have been “conspiracy” type things throughout history (MKUltra, Tuskeegee, Project Paperclip, the COINTELPRO that actually existed and not the one people pretend still exists), they have been discovered fairly quickly. Because someone always has a big mouth.

5 • They use the term term Big Pharma (or Big Anything) in all seriousness

There are about a 1000 problems with the pharmaceutical industry, for sure. However, when your friend is talking about “Big Pharma” they are not usually talking so much about overpriced cancer medication as they are like, vaccines causing autism and things like that. Also, sane people, when discussing the problems with the pharmaceutical industry just do not say things like “Big Pharma” because they like being taken seriously.

Being awake or being asleep is like, tin-foil hat code for being hep to all kinds of nonsense. Which is why on those weird personal ads for Infowars everyone was like “I’ve been awake for 4 months” and things. Sheeple is what they call people who do not go along with them.

See, usually, these people are kind of “new.” Like, they think that the information they are about to rock you with is A) Nothing you have ever heard before or B) Something you are going to buy wholesale, immediately, because their “evidence” is so vastly compelling. If you do not believe them, you are obviously a sheep of a person.

What it really is: The Oak Ridge National Laboratory is the largest science and energy national laboratory in the Department of Energy, and partners with the state of Tennessee, universities, and industries to solve challenges in energy, advanced materials, manufacturing, security and physics.The facility is also home to several of the world’s top supercomputers.

What it really is: The Arnold Engineering Development Center is a Air Force ground based flight testing facility that is used for the testing and evaluating of aircraft, missile, and space systems and subsystems.

What it really is: The Bettis Atomic Power Laboratory is a government owned research and development facility that’s sole purpose is the designing and development of nuclear power resources for the Navy.

While the site itself is restricted from the public and and taking photographs of the site is restricted, the site itself can be easily viewed via Google Maps, and it shows nothing that even closely resembles a prison camp.

Bank runs in February 2009. 9/11-scale terror attacks in 2010. 50% of the U.S. population will be killed in a bio-weapons attack in 2009. 16 year-old soldiers will enforce nationwide martial law by 2012. A major terror attack will occur in the U.S. by the end of summer 2009 (oh, and it’s a false flag). The U.S. will go to war with Russia in 2009. Texas stores are being looted and National Guard troops are moving into Austin right this minute (December 31, 1999). The UN will announce the presence of ET intelligence during 2009 to stage a NWO takeover. The U.S. dollar will be devalued by 50% by 2012.

If you’re Alex Jones, you’re used to being wrong. But that doesn’t stop his wild-eyed fans from listening – there’s always another edge-of-your-seat, apocalyptic prediction coming down the pipeline, after all. In this highly entertaining mash-up, Alex Jones Clips runs down 45 of the most wild, failed Alex Jones predictions.

When you dive into the world of conspiracy theories (either as a skeptic, or a conspiracy theorist, or just a curious onlooker) you will ultimately come across some conspiracy theories that sound really, really bizarre…

In fact ever since I started doing serious skepticism and debunking and investigating conspiracy theories I have found conspiracy theories so strange that I could never have possibly have thought of them (which is probably a good thing).

Now while there are a lot of things I have noticed about bizarre conspiracy theories, I have narrowed it down to five different things.

So here are five things I’ve noticed about bizarre conspiracy theories:

First I want to say that anyone who believes that the world is controlled by shape-shifting aliens, or that the World Trade Center towers were brought down by lasers, or that the government is using radio signals to attack peoples minds, or believes in crisis actors, or believes that chemtrails are real is not necessarily mentally ill… I’m just saying it’s a pretty strong indicator of mental illness, especially when you consider the fact that others who also believe in such conspiracy theories have engaged in behavior that strongly indicates that they are mentally ill (such as making long and incoherent rants, or harassing people, or making threats), or actually has been found out or proven to be mentally ill.

It’s not just the people who believe in them either. Many of the people whom have created the most bizarre conspiracy theories out there are they themselves believed to be mentally ill. Even the ones who are very intelligent and hold college degrees, but come up with these weird conspiracy theories, are automatically assumed to be mentally ill because it’s really the most logical explanation for many skeptics concerning a person whom is very smart but believes in really weird stuff.

4. There is no deep end to them.

Have you ever heard or read about a conspiracy theory that made you think, “there is no way that there can be something stranger than this…” Well, I don’t mean to burst your bubble, but trust me when I say this, there is a conspiracy theory out there that is more bizarre than what you have just heard or read about. And if there isn’t one, one will be invented soon enough.

Now I don’t blame anyone for believing that whenever they hear about a crazy conspiracy theory that they believe that it is the craziest conspiracy theory out there, I use to believe that myself when I came across a really bizarre conspiracy, but then I would be proven wrong again and again whenever I kept coming across one even more bizarre than the next one, it kind of destroyed my ability to believe that there is a bottom to conspiracy theory craziness.

It really should not surprise anyone that there are some conspiracy theories out there that are either so weird, or so bizarre, that some people don’t believe that it is a real conspiracy theory (well, as real as one can be) and that it was made up as a parody of other conspiracy theories, or some type of satire, or, as some conspiracy theorists may claim, dis-information.

This is something that even I have assumed at times whenever I see a bizarre conspiracy theory, either in the hope that no one can seriously be so crazy that they could come up with such a thing, or that it just looks like satire.

In fact some have actually turned out to be satire (or a hoax) but because some conspiracy theorists can’t tell the difference between what is real and what is fake, some of them assume that it is real.

What it really is: The Fernald Feed Materials Production Center was a uranium processing plant that made uranium fuel cores for nuclear weapons. The facility closed in 1989 and the surrounding area has since been turned into a nature preserve.The facility gained notoriety in 1984 when it was learned that the plant had been releasing millions of pounds worth of radioactive dust into the atmosphere, contaminating the surrounding area and costing $4.4 billion to clean up the site.

What it really is:Cavalier Air Force Station is a small Air Force facility with both members from the US and Canadian military stationed there, as well as civilian employees.The station monitors for and tracks potential missile launches against North America, as well as tracks half of all Earth orbiting objects.

What it really is:Seymour Johnson Air Force Base is basically your typical Air Force base.After looking at the base via Google maps I can find nothing there that resembles a prison camp or anything that one would not find on an Air Force base.

What it really is:Seneca Army Depot was closed in 2000, and is now under control by numerous private industries, and as for the state the site hosts the Five Points Correctional Facility and the Seneca County Law Enforcement Center.Currently there is much discussion on what to do with the rest of the land, being that much of it is dotted with concrete storage bunkers that were used to store munitions.

What it really is: The Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory is a research and development facility dedicated to the research, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of the US Navy’s nuclear powered warships.

What it really is:Naval Air Engineering Station Lakehurst is the provider of full spectrum support for aircraft launch, recovery and support equipment systems for U.S. and allied Naval Aviation Forces at sea and Marine Corps Expeditionary Aviation Forces ashore.

The base was also the site of the Navy’s lighter than air programs (i.e. airships, blimps) and still contains two huge hangers that once housed airships.

What it really is:Earle Naval Weapons Station is a Navy Base with a near 3 mile long pier that is used to load and unload ammunition from warships a safe distance away from the heavily populated areas that surround the base.

Also I imagine the site attracts a lot of site seers as well due to the fact that the base has such a huge pier.

What it really is:Pease Air National Guard base is a former Air Force base that was taken over by the New Hampshire Air National Guard in 1991 after Air Force closed the base. The base is also the site of a civilian airport and commercial center called the Pease International Tradeport.

What it really is:Whiteman Air Force Base is home 509th Bomb Wing, a bomber wing that operates the the B-2, so it’s entirely possible the base has some gravity bombs located on site.As for the 10,000 sq. mile missile field, this one is false. Such a field would be HUGE, and the base itself is surrounded by a state park to the west, the town of Knob Noster to the north, and farm land to the south and east, not to mention public roads.

Also, looking at this base via Google maps, I can see nothing there that resembles a prison camp.

What it really is: The Kansas City Plant (now known as Bannister Federal Complex) produces 85% of the non-nuclear materials used in the nation’s nuclear arsenal, as well as other non-nuclear components for the United States national defense systems.

Besides manufacturing, the Kansas City Plant also provides technical services for testing and analyzing of certain things, such as metallurgical/mechanical analysis and environmental testing.

Through my studying of conspiracy theories I have found that many of them are easy to dis-prove. In fact some of them are so easy to dis-prove that it’s actually kind of shocking that anyone believes in them.

Now despite the fact that most conspiracy theories are quite easy to dis-prove, a few of them could actually be proven, and quite easily at that, if a conspiracy theorist was willing to spend the and money to try to prove what they believe is real.

The following is a list of five different conspiracy theories that I feel could be easy to prove:

Despite the overwhelming evidence that the moon landings did happen and that we really did send 12 men to the surface of the moon and back between 1969 to 1972, many conspiracy theorists still insistence that the landings were all faked, and that they were all filmed on some movie set in on a military base in the middle of the desert.

Despite the multiple pieces of “evidence” that they believe prove that the moon landings were faked, they have not produce one shred of evidence that hasn’t ended up being debunked.

Now, despite the fact that all the evidence that they claim proves the moon landings were hoaxed have been debunked, there are actually a few simple (but expensive) ways for them to prove the moon landings were hoaxed:

First, they could build their own telescope that is powerful enough to see close up to the surface of the moon, and look at the moon landing sites to see if anything is there.

Second, build your own satellite and rocket that can travel to the moon and photograph the sites where the moon landings were suppose to be.

Third, build a space ship that can actually get to the moon, land at the sites, and see for yourself if anything is ther. Oh, and here is the bonus part about this one: If it turns out that you’re right, and you prove that the moon landing were faked, “you” become known as the first person to walk on the moon!

Among some conspiracy theorists there is this belief that the government is using aircraft to spray the population with chemicals to either dumb us down, or make us sick, or make us infertile (assuming it’s not for geo-engineering like other chemtrail conspiracy theorists are insisting).

Of course there is no evidence what so ever to prove these claims (despite what they insist) but, there is in fact a very easy way for them to prove that chemtrails are real.

All they would have to do is get a plane, attach a scope or two to that plane (be sure they are the types that remotely open and shut in order to avoid contamination) fly through an alleged chemtrail (actually you might want to do this several times in order to collect several samples, just to be sure) take the samples you’ve gotten, and have them tested to see whats in them, and how high the concentrations are (because that plays a big factor too).

Now, if this is done, one of two things will happen: You and many other conspiracy theorists will be proven to be right, and all skeptics will have to eat their own words (during the revolution that would most likely follow) or, you will be proven to be wrong, and it will be shown that chemtrails are in fact nothing more than water vapor.

What it really is:Portsmouth Naval Shipyard is used by the US Navy for remodeling and repairing submarines. The shipyard is also used by the Coast Guard as a home port for several cutters.The shipyard is also registered as a National Historical Place.

What it really is:Barksdale Air Force Base is an Air Force Base located right next to Bossier City, LA. which would make it difficult to hide a prison camp from the public. Also looking at the base via Google Maps I could not find anything that would not be found on a typical Air Force base.The base itself has several bomber squadrons, so having such weapons there wouldn’t be that unusual either.

What it really is: The actual name for the facility is VLF Transmitter Cutler. The facility is a very low frequency shore radio station used by the Navy to provide one-way communications with submarines.The facility itself has two identical umbrella arrays. The reason for this is because if one has to be taken offline for repairs and maintenance, the other one can remain operational.

What it really is:Schilling Air Force Base was closed 1965 with the only military presence left being the Kansas Air National Guard whom still uses the bombing range and some of the buildings.The former base is now a quiet place that houses a few private businesses, as well as Kansas State University at Salina and Salina Area Technical College

What it really is:Argonne National Laboratoryis the first science and engineering research national laboratory in the United States. It’s five major areas of focus are: Conducting basic scientific research, operating national scientific facilities, enhancing the nation’s energy resources, developing better ways to manage environmental problems, and protecting national security.

The facility is also open to anyone 16 years old or older to take guided tours.

What it really is:Mountain Home Air Force Base is a Air Force base that (after looking at it on Google maps) is out in the middle of nowhere.

The only thing there are some farmer fields that surround the base, mountains, housing for base personal and their families, and some buildings that are common with Air Force bases in order to support and maintain the aircraft there.

What it really is:Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay is a major Navy base that is the home port for the U.S. Atlantic Fleet‘s ballistic missilenuclear submarines which are armed with Trident missile nuclear weapons. Whether the base actually keeps any nuclear missiles on site is unknown as such information would most likely be considered top secret, but even if the base did have nuclear weapons on site, it wouldn’t be unexpected considering the base does support ballistic missile nuclear submarines.

While the base does cover 16,000 acres, 4,000 of those acres are protected wetlands.

The claim: Kahoolawe Island, 28,800. Until 1994, the entire island was off limits to civilians and used for bombardment practice, including simulated nuclear weapons.

What it really is: In 1990 the US Navy ended live fire training on the island of Kaho’olawe. In 1994 the island was transferred to the state of Hawaii.

In 1981 the island was added to the National Register of Historic Places due to its archaeological sites. In 1993 the state legislator established the Kaho’olawe Island Reserve, turning the entire island into a nature reserve.

The island itself has no permanent population due mostly to the fact that the island lacks fresh water.

While it’s location along the coast makes it ideal for missile testing, the fact that it’s next to sugar cane fields (which could be accessed by the public), and in is on flat land, would make it very hard location to hide a FEMA camp on.

What it really is: Pinellas Plant (now known as the Young-Rainy Star Center) use to be a nuclear weapons manufacturing facility operated by the Department of Energy, but is now a high-technology and manufacturing center owned by Pinellas County.

All the buildings located there are basically what would be typically expected at a facility that was both an airport and a military air base. Also, there are multiple civilian facilities surrounding the base (including houses and businesses). It would be highly unlikely that a prison camp could be hidden there for very long without a lot of people seeing it.

What it really is:Eglin Air Force Base is a fairly large Air Force Base. The claim that only 752 acres of the base are actually counted is completely false. In fact it is official knowledge that the base covers 463,128 acres.

The base is also surrounded by towns and cities, has military family housing units, and has scheduled passenger airline service as the Northwest Florida Regional Airport, which is co-located on the base property.

A good conspiracy theory grips the imagination, offers some compelling evidence and makes you look at things in a whole new light. A dumb one, by contrast, throws together a bunch of random crap and makes you want to weep. Here are nine conspiracy theories so objectively stupid they make Donald Trump’s hair look convincing.

9 • The Real Trayvon Martin

Early last year, neighborhood watch member George Zimmerman shot and killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. In the resulting controversy, a rumor arose that the angelic-looking Martin we saw on TV wasn’t the real Martin at all, but a sanitized image planted by agents of the “liberal media” to rig the trial. The real Martin, the theorists claimed, was a muscle-bound, bird-flipping brute of a man—and they had the pictures to prove it.

Only they didn’t. Not really: the guy pictured in that last link? Yeah, that’s a completely different Trayvon Martin. Someone just saw the name on Facebook and apparently didn’t realize that different people sometimes have the same name. But people still bought the theory because they wanted to believe it, and no amount of debunking would change their minds. Right now, the latest “real Trayvon Martin” photo doing the rounds shows a tattooed bruiser who looks more like a 30-year-old gangster rapper than a 17-year-old boy, because that’s exactly what that is: That’s West Coast rapper The Game there, who is currently alive and well and likely astonished at some people’s inability to tell black people apart. It’s the sort of confusion that a quick Google search would have cleared up, but these tinfoil hat–types apparently aren’t all that big on “facts.”

8 • Bush Bombed The Levees

The rescue effort for Hurricane Katrina, one of the worst natural disasters in US history, was itself such a disaster that it led to accusations of racism on the part of the authorities—culminating in the theory that the White House had deliberately bombed the levees to flood black neighborhoods.

The idea is that this was a form of ethnic cleansing, an attempt by the elites to flush the poor and the black out of New Orleans. As a heated response to the failures of those in charge, it’s understandable. As a theory, however, it ignores stuff like the flooding of dozens of rich white neighborhoods and the logistical improbability of government agents detonating several charges of dynamite simultaneously across a city in the grip of a once-in-a-lifetime super-storm.

7 • Obama Can Control The Weather

Sometimes, politicians just get lucky. During a moment of national embarrassment, a story blows up that is so big it allows them to sweep all that bad juju under the rug. Case in point: Just as things were heating up for Obama over Benghazi and the IRS scandal, a tornado swept into Oklahoma and reduced the town of Moore to rubble. Suddenly, stories about administrative incompetence were replaced by images of devastation and appeals for help. So the White House probably just got lucky, right? Well, either that, or Obama deliberately destroyed an unremarkable town using his top-secret weather-control device.

Weird as it may seem, this theory pops up every single time a catastrophic storm hits the United States. When Hurricane Sandytouched down in New York, people claimed it was Obama’s attempt to secure his re-election. When Hurricane Isaac screwed with the Republican convention, Rush Limbaugh claimed it was a White House conspiracy. No matter what the weather does, there is always someone willing to claim Obama caused it—in short, they apparently believe he’s God.

6 • The Daniel Lee Conspiracy

Daniel Lee is a South Korean rapper, best known for his work with hip-hop group Epik High. And according to the internet, he literally doesn’t exist.

To understand the small fragment of sanity underlying this bizarre claim, you need a quick crash course in recent South Korean history. In the 2000s, a scandal erupted across all levels of Korean society: About 120 prominent figures were discovered to have faked their university degrees, and the populace went into paranoia meltdown. In this atmosphere, it was only a matter of time before the nation’s premier hip-hop star would be called out on his Stanford master’s degree. Luckily, Lee was prepared. When people asked, he released his official paperwork. And then things got weird.

People didn’t believe the papers were real. So Lee contacted Stanford and asked them to confirm. At which point, the public decided the university had been fooled, and Lee had stolen the identity of a former student. What followed was a trip down the rabbit hole of South Korean social media: Lee was labeled a fake, told he didn’t exist and transformed into a national hate figure. To this day, people still don’t believe his life really happened. It’s not clear what they do believe, except that Lee’s a liar and deserves punishment. For what, no one’s really sure.

5 • FEMA Camps

The idea that the government is on the verge of rounding us all up into prison camps has been around for a long time. In the 1980s, radical leftists thought Ronald Reagan was on the verge of detaining them for opposing his free-market agenda. In the ‘90s, it was Bill Clinton and the New World Order. Fast-forward to 2013 and the current conspiracy states Obama is preparing re-education centers for exterminating patriots.

In short, it’s a conspiracy that will never die. Despite the fact no one has yet been rounded up, despite the fact that such a large logistical operation would be impossible to keep secret, and despite the fact that there’s no logical reason for the government to do so, people persist in publishing camp location lists like this one. So ridiculous and widespread have these rumors become that even Popular Mechanics felt the need to debunk them—pointing out that most photographic “evidence” has been ripped from reports on North Korea.

Despite not actually being open to the public, it’s in a very open area, and is on flat ground. Any one can see any part of the base at any time (provided they have a boat), making hiding a prison camp here very difficult.

The base itself contains housing and support facilities for more than 21,000 civilian workers, active-duty service members and their families, which would make hiding and actually FEMA camp here difficult as there could be potentially hundreds of people find out about it and have it become publicly known.

The claim: Underground city 2 1/2 miles down super computers here beyond your imagination per Dr. Deagle. Colorado Springs, 3,840What it really is:Schriever Air Force Base is a fairly large Air Force base, with more than 8100 active duty and guard/reserve personnel, civilian employees, and contractors that operate the base.

As for the claims by Dr. Deagle, I find them highly unlikely. Besides the difficulty of going down that deep into the Earth and hollowing out a space large enough for an underground city, the heat that deep down would make it difficult to work in, and would damage these so called super computers.

As for Dr. Deagle himself, well, he promotes a lot of bazaar conspiracy theories and should not be considered a reliable source for anything.

The claim: It is said that NORAD moved in 2007. Colorado Springs, 451What it really is: Despite the belief, NORAD still operates here, it’s just that the installation is under command of the Cheyenne Mountain Division, and has been so since 2006.

What it really is: The base is actually called Buckley Air Force Base, and is an Air Force Space Command base that serves more than 92,000 active duty, National Guard, Reserve and retired personnel throughout the Front Range community.

Since 2000 the base has been going through a large amount of new construction and modernization, including new enlisted airmen’s dormitories, a commissary, a base exchange, a fitness center, and family housing units.

What it really is:Travis Air Force Base is a major Air Force base located next to Fairfield, and is Nicknamed the “Gateway to the Pacific” due to it handling more cargo and passenger traffic than any other military air terminal in the US.

The base also includes 7,260 active USAF military personnel, 4,250 Air Force Reserve personnel and 3,770 civilians.

What it really is: The Sierra Army Depot is an Army supply depot that has been scaling back operation since the 1990’s. By 2001 the depot on had eight ammo storage facilities, about half as many as it did in 1990.

What it really is: Point Mugu (better known as Naval Base Ventura County) has a base population of over 19,000 personnel and over 100 tenant commands. Because of the sheer amount of people there, the base itself contains multiple buildings necessary for base operations and support.

What it really is:Naval Air Station North Island is a near 100 year old Navy base located right next to the city of Coronado, and is surrounded by the city of San Diego, California.

The base hosts 23 aviation squadrons, and 80 additional tenant commands and activities. Because of this it is necessary for the base to have a large amount of support buildings located on it, and due to it’s age it is also sometimes necessary to tear down and rebuild old buildings that are no longer functional for the needs of the base.

What it really is:Moffett Federal Airfield (which is it’s actually name) is a joint civil/military airfield and is owned and operated by the NASA Ames Research Center. The only military presence left at the airfield is the California Air National Guard and the U.S. Army Reserve.

What it really is:March Air Reserve Base is an Air Force Reserve base (I.E. not the main Air Force), but also contains units from the Army, Navy, and Marine Reserves as wall as the California Air National Guard.

There is also an air show there that is held every two years in March, and there have been several proposals in recent years to make the base a joint military/civilian airport.

Skeptics have their work cut out for them. We are up against irrational forces that are becoming very savvy at turning the language and superficial tactics of science and skepticism against science and reason. We are not just debating details of evidence and logic, but wrangling with fully-formed alternate views of reality.

An excellent example of this was recently brought to my attention – an article using published psychological studies to argue that conspiracy theorists represent the mainstream rational view while “anti-conspiracy people” are actually the “paranoid cranks.” The article, by Dr. Kevin Barrett (Ph.D. Arabist-Islamologist) in my opinion nicely reflects how an ideological world-view can color every piece of information you see.

He starts out reviewing an article by Wood and Douglas which examined the comments to news articles about topics that are the subject of conspiracy theories. Barrett summarizes the study this way:

In short, the new study by Wood and Douglas suggests that the negative stereotype of the conspiracy theorist – a hostile fanatic wedded to the truth of his own fringe theory – accurately describes the people who defend the official account of 9/11, not those who dispute it.

The article actually suggests nothing of the sort. Barrett cherry picks what he wants to see from this article and draws conclusions that are not supported by the evidence. The authors of the study found that comments to conspiracy news items were approximately 2/3 pro-conspiracy and 1/3 anti-conspiracy. Barrett concludes from this:

That means it is the pro-conspiracy commenters who are expressing what is now the conventional wisdom, while the anti-conspiracy commenters are becoming a small, beleaguered minority.

This is simply not justified from this data. Barrett assumes that the number of comments reflects the relative percentage of believers in the population, but it is possible (and very likely) that pro-conspiracy people simply comment more, perhaps due to greater passion for their beliefs.

Barrett makes no mention of polls or surveys that more directly get at the question of what percentage of the population believe to some degree in a conspiracy. For 9/11 there have been a number of different surveys conducted in various ways with a range of outcomes, but in all of them, believers in a 9/11 conspiracy are in the minority.

Barrett also ignores the many other conclusions of the paper. They write:

In accordance with our hypotheses, we found that conspiracist commenters were more likely to argue against the opposing interpretation and less likely to argue in favor of their own interpretation, while the opposite was true of conventionalist commenters. However, conspiracist comments were more likely to explicitly put forward an account than conventionalist comments were. In addition, conspiracists were more likely to express mistrust and made more positive and fewer negative references to other conspiracy theories. The data also indicate that conspiracists were largely unwilling to apply the “conspiracy theory” label to their own beliefs and objected when others did so, lending support to the long-held suggestion that conspiracy belief carries a social stigma. Finally, conventionalist arguments tended to have a more hostile tone. These tendencies in persuasive communication can be understood as a reflection of an underlying conspiracist worldview in which the details of individual conspiracy theories are less important than a generalized rejection of official explanations.

The main findings of the study, therefore, are that conspiracy theorists base their opinions largely on an “underlying conspiracist worldview” rather than the specific details of any case. They are not able to put forward and defend a specific alternate theory, but rather are primarily interested in contradicting the official story, whatever that happens to be. This is in line with conventional criticism of conspiracy theorists.

[ . . . ]

In another bit of reality-bending, Barrett writes:

Additionally, the study found that so-called conspiracists discuss historical context (such as viewing the JFK assassination as a precedent for 9/11) more than anti-conspiracists.

I’m convinced that anything can be twisted in a positive or negative way (just read political news stories). Conspiracy theorists believe they are putting events into “historical context” while conspiracy critics might say they are making leaps of logic in order to create the illusion of connections where none exist. In fact, conspiracy thinking is largely about seeing patterns where they do not truly exist – patterns in events that may be unconnected or only loosely connected in a generic cultural/historical fashion.

Barrett goes on to cite 9/11 truthers as if they are objective scholars. For example . . .

What it really is: Edwards Air Force Base is the home of the Air Force’s Flight Test Center and has been the test site for multiple famous military aircraft.

Because this base is a testing facility, and such a large one at that, the base would require multiple large buildings for supporting the aircraft located and tested here. Most of these buildings are located around the runways as well, and not away from them.

The base also has on base housing for families of personnel that are stationed there.

What it really is:Concord Naval Weapons Stationis a former armament storage depot built during World War Two. Much of the base in now closed and is now under consideration by the Navy for local land reuse by the city of Concord.

The base itself only has 620 military personal there. Most of the people who work there are either civilian employees or contractors, combined which makes up a total of 5,900 civilian personal. This combined with the fact that it is in the middle of a desert makes it very unlikely that a FEMA camp could be hidden here.

Ever encounter a conspiracy theorist on the internet? Most of us have, especially if you’re a skeptic like myself who has their own blog about debunking. At that point they tend to come to you.

While there are a lot of things about conspiracy theorist on the internet that I’ve noticed they tend to do, I’ve narrowed it down to five main things.

So here are five things I’ve noticed about conspiracy theorist on the internet:

5. They love using quotes.

Be it in their signature line on an internet forum, or in their timeline on their Facebook page, conspiracy theorists love posting quotes on the internet. Usually these quotes are allegedly from some musician, or politician, or philosopher, or just some famous person whom they think would share their beliefs. Sometimes these quotes are accompanied with a picture of the person who allegedly said it.

The problem with this is that (and this is true anytime someone quotes someone) is that the quotes can be taken out of context, the quote can be mis-quoted, or it could be something that person never said at all.

There is of course one truth about these quotes: they do absolutely nothing to back up what ever conspiracy theory they are claiming to believe in.

4. They love collages.

Go to any conspiracy theorist group on Facebook or conspiracy theorist forum and you’ll usually find some collages of photo-shopped pictures along with conspiracy theory claims within the collage.

These collages are often times confusing at the least, and more times than not, disturbing looking.

Many conspiracy theorists might think these collages helps get whatever point they have across, but the reality is that they are really a turn off for normal minded people and makes them all look like a bunch of wackos.

3. They don’t have a sense of humor.

Conspiracy theorists (at least on the internet) take things way to seriously, and when someone makes a joke or a sarcastic remake, they tend to go ballistic, either because they don’t think you should be joking about the subject at hand, or they think you’re being serious.

They also can’t tell when someone (or some website) is being sarcastic either. An example of this would be Skeptic Project. On the front page of the website it says “Your #1 COINTELPRO cognitive infiltration source.” To most people they are clearly being sarcastic. But apparently some people in the Infowars forums thought they were actually admitting to being a COINTELPRO website.

The claim: Dept. of National Defense reserveWhat it really is: The Department of National Defence is largest employer there, which means is that it employs both military and civilians. The largest base in Canada (in terms of personnel) CFB Halifax, is surrounded by both residential and commercial buildings, which would make it very difficult to hide an interment camp there (not to mention there isn’t much space there to build a prison camp either).

The claim: Located on Great Slave Lake.What it really is: A small village located next to a lake with a poorly chosen name…There are a couple of large buildings there. One happens to be a elementary school, and the other a college.

The claim: Very cold territory ~ NW Territories.What it really is: A small village in the Northwest Territories of Canada. There’s some houses, a small airfield, a couple of abandoned quarries, and quiet a few same lakes, but that’s it.

The claim: Northernmost point on the BC Railway line.What it really is: It’s a town in Northern British Columbia with a population of around 3,900 and a large amount of seasonal tourism. The area also has major natural gas reserves, including a large natural gas field a couple of mile south of the town.

The claim: halfway between Medicine Hat and Primrose Lake.What it really is: It’s a training base that at any given time will have about 1,000 personal located on the base, which grows during the summer when reservists undertake annual training there.

The claim: 70 miles northeast of Edmonton.What it really is: First, the base is called Canadian Forces Lake Cold Lake, not Primrose Lake Air Range.While the base does have several large buildings there, most of them are either hangers or other support facilities for the base itself. There is also civilian housing there and a cadet summer training facility there too.

The claim: just north of Medicine Hat, less than 60 miles from the USA.What it really is:Canadian Forces Base Suffield is the largest base for the Canadian military (after looking are the place via Google maps I can tell you that it is huge), and is used for defense development and research by the Canadian military, and as a training base for the British.Not only is the base very vast, it also doesn’t contain that many buildings, and none are large enough, or in large enough concentrations to even look like a prison camp.

It’s happened to all of us. Some friend we had in elementary school or from an old job is all of a sudden making super weird comments on Facebook, or you’re in a bar and some random [person] is trying to talk to you about fluoride for some reason. It’s not always immediately clear. Like, I realized one day that people saying crazy things were always following it up with “Do your own research!” and then finally discovered that it was sort of a “buzzphrase” for conspiracy theorists.

So, I thought I’d compile a list of the ways to know that someone in your life is starting to head down to tin foil hat alley.

1. Says insane things (probably about chemtrails), and if you dispute, insists that you “Do your own research!”

“I’m a University of YouTube graduate!”

This is one of the earliest signs of this type of crazy- and it’s also a major Glenn Beck-ism. I don’t know about you, but when I state a fact, I’m usually able to explain that fact. Especially if it’s something that may be controversial.

For instance, I do not so much believe that Joan Crawford beat her children. This is a thing that most people believe, because of the movie “Mommie Dearest”– however, when asked to explain, I don’t yell “Do your own research!” at people, I explain that all of the other children (save for Christopher) have refuted Christina’s book, as well as Crawford’s actual personal assistant, and Myrna Loy, and pretty much anyone else who was around during that time. I’m not saying I’m 100% definitely correct on this, but I err on the side of “probably not.”

Still, I don’t throw out something weird, get mad at people for not immediately taking me at my word, and then yell at them to do their own research. I mean, if they want to, that’s fine, but I’m usually quite able to support my arguments.

UGH. These people and their fluoride. They love to make up crap about how the government puts fluoride in the water to keep us dumb and rebellion-resistant, like no one has ever seen “Dr. Strangelove” before or something. This is usually what they start with, probably because it sounds slightly more realistic than like, Lizard People.

It is not, however, true. At all. And yes, I’ve “done my research.” But don’t tell that to these people, especially if they are drunk at a bar, because they will, in fact, start screaming at you about it. Fluoride and the “vaccinations cause autism” thing are like the gateway drugs into tin-foil hat land.

3. Rejecting the tyranny of paragraph breaks

I swear to god, this is a thing. Whenever I see a comment that’s just a giant block of text with no breaks in it, I immediately just go “Welp, this one’s gonna be crazy” and I am pretty much always right. I don’t know why this is a thing, it just is.

4. When a person who you already kinda know isn’t too swift starts trying to pretend that they are some kind of intellectual who is totally going to school you on “how things are in the world.”

I hate to say this, but it’s true. It’s always the dumb ones. I feel bad, because like, they’re usually just coming across this stuff for the first time and it is totally blowing their minds. Like, I already know that some people think that the Rothschilds control the world and that there are Mason things on the dollar bill and also THE MOON LANDING WAS FAKED or whatever. I’ve known for years, and I’ve already figured out that it’s all bullshit.

The more you read about history, the more you realize that people are so not getting it together to form a whole “New World Order” anytime soon. While there have been “conspiracy” type things throughout history (MKUltra, Tuskeegee, Project Paperclip, the COINTELPRO that actually existed and not the one people pretend still exists), they have been discovered fairly quickly. Because someone always has a big mouth.

What it really is:Camp Roberts is a California Army National Guard post that underwent major renovations in 2012, including the demolition of multiple World War Two era barracks that were basically health hazards.

What it really is:Naval Air Station Alameda was closed in 1997. Part of the base is now open to the public, and the site also hosts the USS Hornet museum. The site is also under consideration for redevelopment.

What it really is: Eareckson Air Station is a remote Air Force base located on Shemya Island. While there are several structures on the island, none of them are large enough to hold large amounts of prisoners in and are obviously for base personal and operations.

While the base itself is pretty big, there aren’t many buildings there as there would for a typical Air Force base, and most of the buildings there are dedicated to either housing radar equipment or base personal.

While I did point out some basic differences between the two, I didn’t really go into to much detail into what those differences really are.

Here I have put together a list of things that conspiracy theorists tend to do that sets them apart from conspiracy believers:

Terminology

Conspiracy theorists has certain words that they tend to use and is quite common for them to use in a conversation (or argument). Some of the more common words used are shill, sheeple, blue pill, red pill, and dis-info agent.

There are of course more then just that, but if you hang around enough conspiracy theorist websites (or get into an argument with a conspiracy theorist on Youtube) you’ll learn more of them.

Creating conspiracy theories

One of the primary things that set conspiracy theorists apart from conspiracy believers is that conspiracy theorists actually create conspiracy theories.

Many of these conspiracy theories tend to be either expanding on a already established conspiracy theory, or a conspiracy thats directed at them. Of course, sometimes conspiracy theorists create entirely new conspiracy theories as well.

Emotional Reactions

While conspiracy believers might not become to emotional when discussing a conspiracy theory that they believe in, many conspiracy theorists on the other hand tend to become emotional when they discuss a conspiracy theory they believe. The levels of emotional reactions varies depending on how important the conspiracy theory is to that person, how much they believe the alledged conspiracy affects them, and if the person they are discussing the conspiracy theory with believes them or not.

While the base itself contains several large buildings, none of them appear to be the types you would find in a prison cam,. The base is also surrounded by numerous houses, making hiding anything like a prison camp difficult.

The claim: US Marine Corps Base – Presently home to 30,000 Mariel Cubans and 40,000 Albanians. Total capacity unknown.

What it really is: Actually it’s a navy base, not a Marine base.

Most of the Mariel Cubansthat left Cuba actually ended up in the United States, not Guantanamo Bay, and while Cuban refugees do occasionally slip into Guantanamo Bay, the amount of refugees living there is no where near the 30,000 being claimed. In fact the most ever held there was 10,000 refugees.

There were Kosovar Albanian refugees there in the late 1990’s, but only up to 10,000 were there at the most, and it was temporary until they were later resettled in the United States, or went back home to Kosovo.